


new year’s day

by icepools



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: College, Love Confessions, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:20:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27727397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icepools/pseuds/icepools
Summary: there's glitter on the floor after the partygirls carrying their shoes down in the lobbycandle wax and polaroids on the hardwood flooryou and me from the night before
Relationships: Will Byers/Lucas Sinclair
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	new year’s day

**Author's Note:**

> insp. by “new year’s day” by taylor swift  
> [very very slight tw for sort of self harm. nothing graphic at all, and it’s more from nerves than anything.]

This is exactly why Will didn’t want to invite a lot of people. 

Their apartment is a mess. There’s hundreds of pieces of black and gold and silver confetti on the floor, and even more tiny pieces of glitter in the same colours. Their tables and shelves are covered in beer bottles, some empty, some half full, others open but untouched, abandoned in favour of dancing. Noise makers litter the couch, the floor, every available space. There’s a couple polaroid cameras on the table, their photos strewn about the room.

Messy.

Most of their guests have gone home, drunk off their asses but still mildly coherent. Everyone else, mostly their closer friends and the people Will _actually_ wanted here, are still around. Passed out in the living room, in one the guest rooms. El was so drunk that Will let her sleep in his bed.

The music they played earlier was loud, intense, and good for dancing. Now, the music is slow, understated, and quiet. Lots of piano.

The music isn’t for anyone. It’s nearing four in the morning. No one is awake, all passed-out-drunk or passed-out-exhausted. 

Except Will.

Will did something stupid tonight. Something very, very stupid. 

The volume of the music, the large crowd of people counting down, the look on their face, it was all so _loud_ and happening so _fast_ and he just—

Will holds his face in his hands, shielding his eyes from the empty room. It feels like the walls are staring at him, judging him for his tipsy decision making.

He thinks he’s ruined everything. How can he come back from this? Just walk up to them and say _hey, so that was weird, and silly, and totally doesn’t represent my true feelings for you at all_? No thank you.

So this will be it. The two of them will talk, maybe, or they’ll come to Will tomorrow and tell him they’re moving out but _it’s nothing you did, Will, honest_ even though it’ll be an obvious lie, because of course it was something Will did, they were fine before, he—

A creak in the floorboards saves Will from spiraling too much more. Is that El? He’ll need to get up and help her, she’s probably throwing up or something.

He stares at one of the polaroids on the ground—him and Max grinning wildly, glitter sticking to their cheeks, beer bottles raised in excitement, blurry due to the photographer’s intoxication—while psyching himself up to stand. He’s just about to, too, when a voice breaks through the quiet sound of piano and plucked guitar.

“Hey,” it says, softly and gently, all kindness and warmth, but Will still tenses. He does not turn around. 

“Hey.” he says back, quietly and tentatively, all fear and embarrassment. 

Lucas doesn’t reply verbally. Instead, they slowly come around the couch and sit down next to him. A whole cushion separates them. Will can’t even reach far enough to touch them. Not that he would. 

The silence is thick and horrible and makes Will’s skin itch. He scratches up and down his forearm, hard enough to leave faint red lines but not hard enough to actually hurt himself. He watches his skin turn red in little lines following his nails. He can’t look at Lucas, even though he knows they’re looking at him.

Should he say something? _Yes,_ a little voice in his mind supplies, _obviously. Say you’re sorry. Say you’re stupid. Say something._

He opens his mouth, but nothing comes out.

“You, uh,” Lucas says, voice cracking slightly with how soft they speak. “Are you okay?”

_Am I okay? Absolutely not. But that doesn’t matter. Are_ you _okay? That’s the real question. That’s what matters. What counts. You. Always just you._

_Always you._

It takes some actual effort, but Will does croak out a little, “Fine.” He leaves it at that. Lucas does too. Neither of them know what to do in this situation. They haven’t exactly done it before. 

Will scratches his arm some more. Lucas stares at him. The piano fades into something slightly more uptempo, but not by much. Softly strummed acoustic guitar. 

Will shifts his eyes slightly to the right, chancing a quick glance at Lucas. He can only see their legs and feet, but it’s sort of enough to know that they’re here. Despite Will’s stupidity, they’re here.

Will’s eyes fall to another polaroid, now. This one is from earlier in the night, so it’s less blurry and the subjects are a bit clearer. It’s of himself and Lucas. Lucas is holding him close with an arm around his shoulder, their cheeks squished together. They’re smiling widely, so so big. They’re happy.

Against his will, Will’s eyes fill with warm and salty tears.

“I’m sorry,” he forces out, voice seconds from breaking. 

“Will—“

“ _No,_ ” Will says, harshly. He shakes his head. “Sorry. Just—let me finish. Please. I swear I won’t say anything after, just let me...let me finish,”

Lucas pauses, sighs, then whispers, “Okay.”

And so Will talks. 

“I’m really, really sorry, Lucas. You know I wouldn’t do anything to ruin what we have, I know you know that. It was just—everything, I don’t know, came crashing down or something. Everyone was so _loud_ and your face was so loud and my heartbeat was so, _so_ loud it just—happened. And I’m sorry.

“I—I feel like you’ve kinda gotten to this point in your brain but I really, _really,_ really lo—like you,” Will stops, thinks it over, then backtracks, “No. I do love you. I didn’t want to say that, it’s such a big word and I didn’t want to scare you off,” he scoffs at this, bitter and angry. His nails dig into his wrist, just a little. “As if I haven’t already done that.”

He can hear Lucas scratching at their jeans, eager to jump in and say something, but they know Will isn’t finished so they don’t. 

As he talks, a single, lone tear falls down his cheek and onto his mouth. He doesn’t even wipe at it, just keeps going.

“I was so, so selfish tonight. I shouldn’t have done that. Shouldn’t have taken that from you. Not that you’ve never done it before, but that’s one more wasted on me. You don’t deserve that. But it’s just so _hard._ These stupid feelings, they just...keep boiling and boiling until they’re spilling over the edges and I just can’t _take it anymore._ They’re so intense, so real and raw and selfish that it hurts so much to keep them in for so long.”

More tears are falling, now, but Will continues. Doesn’t stop until he’s really finished.

“So I understand if you hate me. I understand if you want to move out, or never speak to me again, or cut me off from all of our friends so you never even have to hear about me again. I...fucked up. So I deserve anything you throw at me. Do your fucking worst. I can take it. I can…” Finally, his voice breaks, and, through a sob, he finishes with, “I can take it.”

And then he’s gone.

His hands leave his arms (good, he was probably going to draw blood if he kept going with that) and move up to his head. One covers his mouth, muffing the sobs that fall from it only slightly. The other fists itself into his t-shirt and he grips tightly, so tightly that he can feel the other parts of his hand through the fabric. 

And Lucas…

Lucas doesn’t say a word.

He knows they’re still there, can feel their weight on the other end of the couch. Perhaps they’re taking in what Will said, confirming what they already knew, figuring out how to get out of this apartment as soon as possible.

Anything but comfort Will. Which is okay. The hand that was caught in his shirt moves up to his face, roughly wiping at his cheeks. It’s futile, more tears come down within seconds. His hand wipes so hard it almost hurts.

His grip on his cheek is tightening when a soft set of fingers wraps around his wrist very gently. Another grips his other wrist, the one connected to the hand on his mouth. Slowly, both hands are pulled away. Will keeps his gaze down. He knows who’s touching him and he very much doesn’t want to look at them. 

“You’re not gonna look at me?” Lucas asks, stroking his wrists with their thumb. It sort of stings on the little indents he made with his nails. “Okay. That’s fine. Can I talk now, though?”

They take the silence as a yes, apparently.

“Okay, first off, I’m not abandoning you forever because you…” they pause here, and oh god they can’t even _say it_ they’re so disgusted, “because you kissed me.”

Oh.

“Got it? You’re my _best friend_ and you mean everything to me and I’m not leaving you forever for kissing me, and you don’t need to apologize for it, or call yourself selfish, or _cry_ like this,” One of Lucas’ hands releases his wrist and comes up to his face instead. A thumb strokes over his under eye, and he flinches from the touch. Lucas sighs, and retracts their hand. “I hate seeing you cry. And I know you hate people seeing you cry.”

That’s true. Will sniffles a little, sobs subsided and turned into soft little cries and whimpers. 

“Can I...tell you why I ran away after you kissed me?” Lucas whispers, hand back on his hand and rubbing softly. Will nods the tiniest bit. “I was so shocked—so surprised that...that you could…that you seemingly felt the same.”

What does that mean? Felt the same about wha—

Oh. Right. That.

Ever so slowly, Will lifts his head, finally meeting Lucas’ gaze. He’s surprised to see tears on their cheeks and in their eyes, red around the edges. That was him.

“You’re my best friend, Will. You mean everything to me,” they pause, smile a bit, and place a hand on his cheek. He doesn’t pull away this time. “I love you.”

Will shakes his head. Too much. Not enough. Everything. Nothing.

“Will,” Lucas murmurs, and they lean in just a little, “can I kiss you?”

Instead of answering, Will shakes his head and cries out, grabs Lucas’ face, pulls them in and kisses them for the second time tonight.

It lasts longer than their first. Their first was Will panicking at midnight, pressing their lips together for just a second. This kiss feels panicked, yes. But calm. Allowed. Okay.

Will kisses Lucas like he’s dying. Like this is the last time they’ll ever see each other. He kisses them like he’s dreaming, like he’ll wake up in a few seconds alone and miserable and the real Lucas will already be gone. He pushes and pulls and grabs and cries and Lucas just follows him, lets him set the pace, lets him make the decisions.

Will pulls away after another couple seconds, crying and shaking and breathing heavily. His hands are still on Lucas’ face.

“Is this—is this real? You’re real?” he chokes out, strained and pained, terrified that it’s not, that Lucas isn’t, that this is all some sick joke his mind is playing on him. Or worse, Lucas themself. 

But Lucas just smiles and rests their forehead against his. “Yeah, Will. It’s real. We’re real.”

Will cries out again, squeezing his eyes shut. “So you—“

“Yup. Ten years,”

Will’s eyes shoot open. He blinks a couple times. “Nine for me.”

Lucas grins. “I win.”

Will lets put a sound in between a laugh and a sob.

“D’you think—I mean, what are—“ Will is doing his best to form the words, but they’re not coming to him. He doesn’t know what he’s asking. _What are we? What is this? Where do we go from here?_

Lucas takes his struggles in stride, stroking a thumb over his wet cheekbone. “I don’t really know either, Will. We’ll have to figure it out as we go. But what I _do_ know is that whatever happens, whatever we do, it’s gonna be you and me. Forever.”

Forever. That sounds nice. Will smiles, just a little. “Okay.”

Lucas smiles too. “Okay,” Then, they glance to their left and catch sight of the polaroid that caused Will to spiral. They pick it up and examine it, smiling all the while. “This is nice. Doesn’t belong on the floor, does it?”

Will shakes his head. He takes the photo from Lucas and holds it in his hand. With his other hand, he takes one of Lucas’ and holds it tightly. Lucas squeezes it once, twice, three times. 

Will looks around the room. At the mess of confetti and glitter on the ground, at the empty bottles of beer and the polaroid cameras devoid of film. The noise makers on the floor. The pictures covering every empty space not hidden by little strips of black, silver and gold paper. It’s the definition of New Year’s Day.

He kisses Lucas again, just because he can.


End file.
